How To Effortlessly Sell Online

When you successfully incorporate these 3 tips, you can drastically improve your online sales strategy and deliver more value.

Buying and selling are the lifeblood of for-proft businesses. This is why it’s incredibly important to know how to sell. However, many entrepreneurs are wary of coming off as sleazy, pushy hucksters.

Fear not, because selling with repeated (and long-term) success doesn’t have to include selling your soul in the process.

So how do you reconcile your desire to make people buy from you and look immeasurably cool while you’re at it? Simple. All you have to do is harness the power of buying psychology the good way.

Below are a few little-known psychological triggers that you can use to boost your sales copy.

1. Lead with an amazing value proposition

Nabbing a sale requires a good first impression. Can you imagine buying from a business whose offering is as vague as your bathroom mirror after turning on the heater? If you answered no, you’re in line with the majority of other buyers.

When a visitor lands on your site, the first thing that usually goes through his or her mind is, “What does this business have for me?” Leading with a superb value proposition paves the way to establish that your marketing message is worth the read. In fact, a poor or missing value proposition is a common reason why people leave your site without converting.

So what makes for an amazing value proposition? It has to be relevant and valuable to your visitors in order to pass through their snap judgments. Explain clearly what your offering is about and how it can solve a specific problem. A good example of this would be CrazyEgg’s value proposition of “Website Behavior Tracking at an Unbeatable Price.”

2. Be all about value — the free kind first

Business isn’t always about making a buck. When you make it a point to give value first, it’s much easier to turn prospects into buying customers. Psychology says this is rooted in the rule of reciprocity. When your helpful with no immediate return it encourages people to return the value they’ve received; either by buying from you or by following your brand.

A more concrete example of this is an experimental study where one group of waiters offered a mint after dinner while the other group didn’t. The group who offered mints increased their tips by 3% and as much as 14% and 23% when they offered more.

This just goes to show that providing value has the power to make people feel special and more generous. Not only will your audience want to return the favor, but many will want to develop a long-term relationship with you.

You can make use of this tip by getting to know what your audience finds valuable and then include those things in your sales copy. If you want to up your game, you can also provide an extremely helpful resource that solves a problem—for free.

3. Use stories to persuade

If you think stories should be relegated to literature, friendly chats and the gossip grapevine, you might want to reconsider your view. Studies have shown that stories are a great persuasive tool.

Most people don’t like to feel that they’re being sold to and are often wary of sales pitches even before getting to read them. The key here is to use stories instead to connect with your prospects. Everyone loves a good story and it’s an easy way for your audience to relate to you or your business. If they can see aspects of themselves or what they’re going through in your story, they’re much more likely to patronize your brand.

You can incorporate a story into your sales copy by using detailed imagery and elements of suspense. There are also story arcs you can easily follow such as transformation tales, rags to riches, and overcoming the monster, to name just a few. You can model your own story from these by picking what would suit your brand best and then including your own details into the mix.

Takeaways

Although there are many more well-known psychology concepts you can use to boost sales, the above tips can craft compelling sales messaging without pandering to run-off-the-mill conventions. When you successfully incorporate the above tips, you can drastically improve your online sales strategy and deliver more value.

This article has been edited.

Jeanne San Pascual is a freelance copywriter with a passion for information and anything that’s unconventionally interesting. She specializes in delivering data-backed website and SEO copywriting that sells. If you need copy that’s sure to convert, contact her now!

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